Oct

26

Lawyer Claims Rapist “Misread the Situation”

Filed Under Europe, International, courts, misogyny, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 11 Comments

In Scotland, a man was convicted of raping a woman who fell asleep on his couch. She was unconscious throughout the assault, and woke to find herself partially undressed. Craig Byars admitted to the rape and has been sentenced to four years in jail.

But in spite of that confession, his lawyer is still making excuses — assuring us of what a good guy Byars really is, and that raping a sleeping woman is the kind of thing that can happen to the best of us!

Defence counsel Shahid Latif said Byars apologised for the consequences of his actions on the victim.

He said: “I have to stress that what happened was a gross error of judgement on his part. He misread the situation.”

He misread the situation.

The tendency for defenses of a rapist to continue even after he has been convicted or has confessed is something that gets under my skin at the best of times. There is seemingly a compulsive desire by every rapist and those close to him to ensure that the world knows he’s actually a good person. First of all, whether or not he’s a “good person” is incredibly irrelevant to the subject of whether or not he raped someone. Secondly, as we live in a world where only bad, bad men, evil, slimy subhuman creatures, are considered to be capable of raping, the insistence that raping someone was out of character for this particular rapist, a simple mistake, an error in judgment, seems to me to be the same thing as saying “yes, so he raped a woman this one time! But that doesn’t make him a real rapist.”

But this specific defense strikes me as a particularly awful and apologist way of making an already awful and apologist argument.

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Oct

22

New York Ruling Eases Name Changes for Transgender People

Filed Under LGBTQ, courts, gender, human rights, trans | 4 Comments

The New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan has made a ruling that will make it easier for transgender people to petition for a name change. The ruling overturned a previous decision by a lower court:

Should a transgender person seeking judicial permission to change her or his name be required to furnish medical documentation justifying the change?

A panel of justices in State Supreme Court in Manhattan ruled on Wednesday that the answer is no. The ruling was a victory for the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund, a nonprofit advocacy organization.

The fund had brought the case on behalf of a transgender man, Olin Yuri Winn-Ritzenberg, who had petitioned the New York City Civil Court seeking to legally change his name from Leah Uri Winn-Ritzenberg.

In February, a Civil Court judge in Manhattan, Manuel J. Mendez, denied the petition, ruling that Mr. Winn-Ritzenberg first had to provide a letter from a physician, psychologist or social worker documenting the “need” for the name change.

Michael D. Silverman, the executive director of the transgender advocacy group, argued that the state’s common law generally allows an adult “to change his or her name at will, for any reason,” and that transgender petitioners like Mr. Winn-Ritzenberg were being held to a higher standard. About 10 other people, all in Manhattan, have approached the fund with similar reports of having their name-changing petitions denied for the same reason Judge Mendez gave.

Legally changing one’s name is one of many major hurdles that trans people face during transition, and the unnecessary difficulty of the process is just yet another way that a cis controlled system polices trans people’s genders and identities. Cis people already regularly feel as though they get to call trans people by the incorrect name, and that’s all about reinforcing undeserved privilege. Further, the issue is about more than just respect and the right of every person to be called what they want to be called — which ought to be enough — but also about basic safety. In a world where transphobia is so regularly expressed through violence and seriously consequential discrimination, one’s official documents matching their identity can sadly be a matter of life and death, or of accessing needed services or not.

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Oct

21

National Survey On Children’s Exposure To Violence

Filed Under patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 2 Comments

The U.S. Department of Justice has released a national report called Children’s Exposure to Violence: A Comprehensive National Survey (pdf). It’s being billed as the most comprehensive study to date on children’s exposure to violence in the United States. The resulting statistics are pretty terrifying. From the introduction:

More than 60 percent of the children surveyed were exposed to violence within the past year, either directly or indirectly (i.e., as a witness to a violent act; by learning of a violent act against a family member, neighbor, or close friend; or from a threat against their home or school) (for full details on these and other statistics cited in this Bulletin, see Finkelhor et al., 2009). Nearly one-half of the children and adolescents surveyed (46.3 percent) were assaulted at least once in the past year, and more than 1 in 10 (10.2 percent) were injured in an assault; 1 in 4 (24.6 percent) were victims of robbery, vandalism, or theft; 1 in 10 (10.2 percent) suffered from child maltreatment (including physical and emotional abuse, neglect, or a family abduction); and 1 in 16 (6.1 percent) were victimized sexually. More than 1 in 4 (25.3 percent) witnessed a violent act and nearly 1 in 10 (9.8 percent) saw one family member assault another. Multiple victimizations were common: more than one-third (38.7 percent) experienced 2 or more direct victimizations in the previous year, more than 1 in 10 (10.9 percent) experienced 5 or more direct victimizations in the previous year, and more than 1 in 75 (1.4 percent) experienced 10 or more direct victimizations in the previous year.

Again, those are a lot of really scary numbers, and there are a whole lot of statistics there to let sink in. But in short, our nation’s children are being abused, witnessing abuse, and being taught how to abuse, all at exceedingly high rates. With what we know about cycles of abuse, this only provides us with yet more reason to make the reduction of violence a major priority.

But due to the wide scope of this study and consequential difficulty of discussing it comprehensively, I want to focus in a bit on the results about sexual violence. Above, it states that 6% of children surveyed were victimized sexually within the past year. Again, I need to emphasize this: not in their lifetimes, but within the past 365 days.

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Oct

17

Judge Refers to Convicted Rapist’s Actions as “Rough Play”

Filed Under assholes, courts, misogyny, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 8 Comments

Trigger Warning

I’ve written before about Fernando Manuel Alves, a pub owner who was convicted of brutally raping a drugged and unconscious woman, and the judge who decided not to send him to jail because he deemed the rape a crime of opportunity.

Now, via Broadsides, we’ve got the actual decision, and what it contains is incredibly disturbing. First of all, it confirms that the judge referred to the rape as a crime of opportunity — and horrifically reveals that he said as much when the prosecution asked that Alves be ordered to undergo counseling.

[51] MS. GAULD: And, Your Honour, just another condition I would ask you to consider is counselling as directed.

[52] THE COURT: No. What you did, sir, was reckless, but not something that shows some pathological danger to the community; indeed, the contrary. It was an opportunistic event, one that has caused tremendous harm to G.E. and her family and hopefully they can put this behind them.

Nice, he doesn’t need counseling because raping an unconscious and drugged woman is only reckless and does not pose a danger to the community. (What, did you think that women were a part of the community? There would be your mistake!) Also, it wasn’t actually a crime of opportunity … just an event.

But despite the new information about the judge refusing counseling as a part of the sentence, I’ve already discussed this aspect of the decision at length. Feel free to read it again. What I’m currently interested in is a newly revealed remark by the judge about the violence that Alves inflicted on his victim. He didn’t call it “violence.” Nor brutality, or physical force, or serious assault, or any other such appropriate phrase. And yes, even for rape apologists who don’t see rape itself as violence, what Alves did should be very easily considered violent (again, trigger warning):

[5] In Exhibit A, it is clear that G.E. was very distressed over what had happened, and the fact that she had a complete memory loss. She reported by way of injuries that her shoulders were tender and bruised. There was some bruises on her legs and the back of an arm. Her nipples were sore and bleeding. There was also significant pain and swelling to the vaginal area and there was some blood in the urine. It is indicated in Exhibit A that over the two weeks following the incident that her eyes became black. She had no recollection how the injuries were received which injuries are detailed in appendix B.

I’m pretty sure that these types of injuries do not generally appear, at least not all together, for reasons other than violence. I’m pretty sure that the fact that this was violence should be especially clear when the injuries were sustained after what has now been legally determined to be a rape.

But Judge Rideout has a different term for it (bold mine):

[6] There was also detailed in Exhibit B pictures of the complainant with the accused with his cellphone taken at or about two o’clock in the morning where there is no evidence of any injuries. It would appear to be clear that there was some rough play in relation to the sexual contact which resulted in injuries to G.E.

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Oct

16

Attorney Uses “Boys Will Be Boys” Defense in Alleged Sexual Assault

Filed Under assholes, courts, education and schools, misogyny, patriarchy, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 19 Comments

Last week, a freshman at the University of Maryland allegedly gained access to a dorm that was not his own, entered a female student’s room and woke her up by trying to kiss her. He also twice tried to put his hands down her shorts. When the victim screamed, he allegedly ran across the hallway to another room, and grabbed another female student by the head and tried to kiss her. Then, according to the official report, he did something similar to two other students in two other dorm rooms.

So, Seth Rudnitsky allegedly entered several dorm rooms illegally and then attempted to sexually assault their residents. Apparently Rudnitsky has even confessed to entering the dorm rooms and touching the women, though he does not say that he attempted to kiss the women or put his hands inside their clothing. In any case, what he has confessed to alone is already a serious crime — which is why he has been charged with first-degree burglary.

But Rudnitsky’s defense attorney Mark Schamel frames the allegations differently:

Mark Schamel, Rudnitsky’s attorney, said Rudnitsky was intoxicated and made a “typical freshman” mistake. Schamel declined to comment on the specific allegations from the female students who said Rudnitsky tried to initiate unwanted sexual conduct.

“This is not a sexual assault case. You have a really good kid who has never been in trouble his entire life,” Schamel said. “It’s your typical freshman ‘I went out and had too much to drink and was being silly’ kind of case.”

Charging documents refer to the incidents as “unwanted physical contact.” In an interview with police, Rudnitsky admitted to entering “3 to 4 rooms and touching a bed, arm, or shoulder,” according to the documents.

…

Schamel said his client simply made a mistake.

“He had no ulterior motives. He’s a wonderful kid who had too much to drink,” Schamel said. “This frankly shouldn’t even be a criminal case. I think it’s being entirely blown out of proportion.”

You know, the last time I checked, breaking and entering and then sexually touching sleeping people without their consent is not actually a “typical freshman mistake.” And trying to put your hands inside a sleeping woman’s clothing is not “being silly” — it’s assault. How exactly did you spend your college years, Mr. Schamel?

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Oct

12

Boss Admits to Firing Woman Because of Her Gender Identity

Filed Under LGBTQ, bigotry, discrimination, gender, human rights, legislation, misogyny, politics, trans, transphobia and trans misogyny, work | 7 Comments

Vandy Beth Glenn was fired in 2007 when she informed her boss her boss that she was a trans woman with plans to begin her transition. With Lambada Legal, she has since launched a federal lawsuit against her former employer, the Georgia General Assembly. (Yes, you did in fact read that correctly — her employer was a government body.) In an interview, she said:

“Mr. Brumby told me that people would think I was immoral. He told me I would make other people uncomfortable, just by being myself. He told me that my transition was unacceptable. And over and over, he told me it was inappropriate.”

Then, Brumby fired Glenn.

“I’m not sure I was really thinking anything in that moment other than utter shock,” Glenn told ABCNews.com. “That he was so matter of fact about it blew my mind.”

Now, Sewell Brumby has actually confessed to firing Glenn on the basis of her gender identity, while still claiming to have done no wrong (warning: transmisogynistic/transphobic language contained in the quoted text):

During the deposition, Brumby describes Glenn, who is referred to in court documents by her pre-transition name of [redacted], as not being very good at her job and not particularly well-liked. Brumby said several times that Glenn’s transition would have been disruptive to his workplace.

“I think it would have been, I suppose, an unusual and notorious event. And I think when unusual and notorious events happen in the workplace it distracts the people in that workplace and takes away from the performance of their job duties,” he said.

Although the legislative cousel office has four one-stall gender-neutral bathrooms, Brumby was concerned about what would happen if Glenn were to use one of the public women’s bathrooms. He also expressed personal concerns about his reactions to Glenn’s transition.

“I think it would have made it very uncomfortable and emotionally upsetting for me to communicate with [Glenn's male name redacted] under those circumstances, and I imagined that some other number of our employees would feel likewise,” he said.

“It makes me think about things I don’t like to think about, particularly at work … I think it’s unsettling to think of someone dressed in women’s clothing with male sexual organs inside that clothing.”

Brumby couldn’t explain to Cole Thaler, the Lambda Legal attorney representing Glenn, why it was upsetting.

“It’s not something that I enjoy thinking about, and I think it would have been unsettling to have a constant reminder to think about something I don’t like to think about,” he said.

Brumby called her transition unnatural, but said he didn’t make moral judgments while acknowledging others would. He said that some in the legislature would view Glenn’s transition as “liberal or ultra-liberal” and could lose faith in the office’s required neutrality.

Shorter Brumby: In addition to generally being a transphobic bigot, I also can’t stop thinking about the genitalia of the women who work in my office, and see this as a reason why they should be fired instead of myself.

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Oct

10

Discussion on Rape Culture on Womanist Musings Blogtalk Radio Podcast

Filed Under blogging, personal and self-promotion, rape and sexual assault, violence against women and girls | 3 Comments

podcast

Tomorrow, Sunday, October 11 at 8pm EST, I’ll be on the Womanist Musings Blogtalk Radio show. Melissa McEwan from Shakesville and I will be discussing rape culture, as well as the Roman Polanski case, with Renee Martin and her podcast co-host Monica Roberts from Transgriot.

I’m not quite entirely sure at the moment what I’ll have to say on the subject — let alone in the awesome company of Liss, Renee and Monica — but with any luck I’ll come up with something. You can go to the podcast page to tune in live — and even call in to chat with us — or wait until it’s over and listen on demand. I’m really excited to be taking part, and I hope you’ll check it out!

Oct

9

Happy Birthday, Mr. Lennon

Filed Under Gratuitous Beatles Blogging, fun | 4 Comments

Today, October 9, is John Lennon’s birthday. He would have turned 69. It’s also my mom’s birthday, so Happy Birthday, Mom! (And let us not further forget Sean Lennon, and the fantabulous Giles Martin. Amazing people are born on October 9, that’s all I can say.)

Last year, in honor of this day, I posted Imagine. I considered posting Mother this year, but seeing as how it’s also my mom’s birthday, thought it might give a wrong impression about my relationship with her! So instead, I’m going to go with God:

Lots of people hear this song as John burning bridges and slamming doors. It is, in part — and I can also imagine that hearing the song when it first came out was probably traumatic for a lot of Beatles fans. But I tend to think that John needed to close those doors to open new ones. Many people logically hear all of the things that John doesn’t believe in; I tend to hear “I just believe in me, Yoko and me,” and I find that an incredibly hopeful message. Plenty hear John denouncing his identity as the walrus, but I tend to hear him claiming his true identity. I hear him announcing that he is John, and I hear him coming to peace with that.

I’ve also argued for a long time that while starting one of the Beatles was one of the best things that ever happened to John, breaking up the Beatles was one of the best things that ever happened for him personally, too. Whatever you think about the effect on his music, I think that it allowed him to grow and find happiness that staying with the Beatles never would have. With this song, John may in fact be smashing his public image, and a perception that many people held dear — but I think he’s also establishing himself. And I find that fitting on a day for celebrating his life.

Because I need it, you also get the bonus track of Hold On:

Happy Birthday, John. Also, for those who are interested, don’t forget to watch Yoko’s lighting of the Imagine Peace Tower. It goes on at 3:30 EST.

Oct

8

All Denials of Coverage For Pre-Existing Conditions Deserve Equal Outrage

Filed Under disability, legislation, violence against women and girls, women’s health | 16 Comments

You’ve almost certainly heard: in certain U.S. states, insurance companies are legally calling domestic violence a “pre-existing condition” and are therefore refusing to cover any treatment related to it. If the person in question doesn’t disclose the domestic violence prior to taking on insurance, they can have their coverage dropped by the insurance company. And, in the cases that are making the most news, those who have previously been victims of domestic violence are being denied access to insurance entirely.

The story has been around for several weeks now. And seemingly, it’s not going away anytime soon. I keep seeing more details pop up in my Twitter feed. In my blog reader, someone shared an item at Jezebel about the Democratic plan to ban the classification of domestic violence as a pre-existing condition. Of course, this ban is a part of the plan to end the denial of coverage on the basis of pre-existing conditions, period — but for some reason, the issue of domestic violence deserves explicit mention. Indeed, we’re seeing it get all kinds of special attention at various feminist blogs — and by our First Lady.

The question that too few people are asking is “Why?” No, no, not “Why do insurance companies do this?” — I think we know that answer — but “Why does it deserve special attention and outrage?”

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Oct

5

U.S. Fence Causes Increase in Border Crossing Deaths

Filed Under bigotry, human rights, immigration, legislation, politics, race and racism, violence against women and girls | 4 Comments

u.s./mexico border fence

A recently released study by the American Civil Liberties Union of San Diego and Imperial Counties and Mexico’s National Commission on Human Rights (h/t abbyjean) shows that there has been an increase in migrant deaths at the U.S.-Mexico border in the past year:

Marking the 15th anniversary of the misguided border strategy known as Operation Gatekeeper, the report makes visible the following:

  1. In the past 15 years, as many as 5,600 people have died.
  2. These deaths were anticipated in the design of the U.S. border strategy, which deliberately pushes migrants away from inhabited areas into harsh desert and mountainous terrains.
  3. The rate of deaths has increased despite the economic decline and a drop in migration.
  4. The number of rescues has decreased despite a massive increase in Border Patrol agents.

And of course this study is only looking at deaths, and therefore leaves out injuries that don’t result in a fatality, as well as the extraordinarily high rate of sexual assault committed against women crossing the border.

Though it’s important to have the numbers, both to be able to quote them and to be able to attract media attention, none of this should come as a surprise. In fact, advocates for immigrants rights have long warned that exactly this would happen in the event of “border security” being increased, and particularly in the event of the border fence being expanded. It’s only logical: people do not attempt to cross the U.S. border in hopes of finding work without documentation unless they’re facing some sort of desperation, and fences don’t make desperation go away, make the legal route to U.S. entry any less expensive or any more accessible, or put food on family’s tables. Build a fence, and many people will find another, more dangerous way — and those who authorized and built the fence knew that damn well at the time they did so.

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